This past year, Quincy University has hired a new Vice President for University Advancement, Dr. Robert Wyatt. Wyatt is responsible for all of the fundraising for the university, and is in charge of all communications and community relations. Anytime QU interacts with the community, the work that is done falls under the umbrella of the advancement offices.

“We primarily work with media, we field any kind of media inquiries and we got a lot of them here because we have faculty who are really experts with some of the content areas that they have. This could also mean we help somebody who wants to organize a food drive and they need our help in providing a location here and our help in making that happen. I’d say personally that is not what I do very much. 90 percent of my job is asking for money,” Wyatt said. 

QU’s most celebrated gift from this past year was the $6.5 million Oakley gift. There were 23 family members who were on stage when the school hosted the celebration, and 11 different family members signed agreements for this gift. This was the largest gift in the history of QU as well as the largest gift Wyatt has been a part of. Wyatt explained that usually when you see gifts of this size, the people who donate pledge it out over a span of many years. But by the middle of this year the majority of this money will already be in QU’s possession. 

QU’s newest endeavor is the ability to accept crypto currency. The school has already received their first donation. The advancement offices worked out a deal where they received 40 $COIN TRX (Tron). 18% of QU investors hold crypto currency, so diving into this corner of the market was a smart decision. 

“Having Dr. Wyatt on campus as our Vice President of Advancement has been exciting. He not only has helped us raise money but has served as an advocate and mentor for students and the QU community. We appreciate all that he has been able to do and will do,” Christine Tracy said. 

Another new idea Wyatt has brought to campus was having student ambassadors. These students are an extremely diverse group expanding across all ages, clubs, and athletic organizations. These students get an opportunity to work with Wyatt as well as the board of trustees. They also interact with donors and go to large gift ceremonies like the Oakley event. 

“I like being a student ambassador because I like representing Quincy,” Grant Hajicek said. “Dr. Wyatt is very passionate about his job. He cares a lot about his students and truly wants us all to be successful, and he makes that known.”